


Like Real People Do

by NedandChuck



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Post s2 finale, a lot of talk about sex but no actual smut, shdhddh sorry i cant write sex scenes!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 15:10:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17962922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NedandChuck/pseuds/NedandChuck
Summary: Snapshots of Juno and Nureyev’s relationship in the form of the first four times they had sex.(There’s no actual smut, but a lot of talk about sexual acts!!)





	Like Real People Do

**Author's Note:**

> I got this idea while listening to the new Hozier album ajdbdb it’s just a short dumb thing I wanted to get out of my head but I had fun writing it so please enjoy !!

   Juno Steel had no idea, before Nureyev, that sex could be fun. Not that it could be, but that maybe it _should_ be fun. Obviously, it was a fun act, but he had never been allowed to just…be silly. Hadn’t known it was an option.

  Nureyev was now Apollo Stone, and when he had introduced himself he flashed Juno a sharp-toothed smile that Juno could feel in his stomach, replacing all the annoyance he felt at Nureyev’s comment of, “What an odd coincidence,” with the twist of feelings he had come to expect whenever he met this man. Later, Nureyev would tell Juno that he had thought of calling himself Jupiter, but didn’t want to be associated with that particular god.

  Their first time had been somber and the most romantic thing Juno had ever experienced. The promise of a tomorrow that neither of them knew wasn’t coming, an exciting but ultimately slow and serious event.

  The second time was fueled by a kind of resentment and lust. Both of them had been pretending not to have fallen in love two years ago for so long, and it came to a head in the form of a screaming match in Nureyev’s room that led to Juno yanking Nureyev down by the collar and smashing a bruising kiss to his lips. Juno regrets doing that; regrets muddying something special with feelings of anger, but he had to admit that it was a really hot night.

  He didn’t leave after.

  Instead, like a cheap mockery of their first time, he watches Nureyev’s sleeping face, this time not pillowed against his chest because that would speak of some feelings that neither of them wanted to address. When Juno knew Nureyev was asleep when he recognized the snuffling snores and innocent face – though this time noticeably lacking the hope that once filled his sleeping expression – he talked to him.

  “I’m sorry,” Juno whispered, pausing when Nureyev stirred and mumbled in his sleep, “I’m helplessly in love with you, Peter Nureyev, and I might never have the guts to tell you.”

  The weight that fell off his chest when he said those words out loud was so much like the time he admitted to Nureyev that he was the best thing that ever happened to him. And Juno still believed that.

  The third time, it was desperate and finally, finally full of honest feelings. Nureyev had almost died, he was almost gone from Juno’s life right after they had started to figure out how to ignore their feelings for one another and be friendly. Juno had begun to hope that maybe they could eventually find their way back to where they were before he made a stupid decision.

  And then he sees Peter fall.

  Juno just barely had the wherewithal not to scream out Nureyev’s real name, but he did scream and turn to fire haphazardly into the being that thought itself important enough to try and best _Peter Nureyev_ until the thing went down. Jet must have kept Nureyev in their ship’s sorry excuse for a medbay longer in order to punish Juno for something because the time he spent in that room felt like an eternity.

  Juno paced the common room floor until Rita and Buddy practically yelled at him to go to his room. Oddly, the only sympathy he was given came from Vespa, who sat close to her wife as though remembering the week before when she was the one holed up in the medbay.

  A hole was nearly worn in the floor of his room by the time that Nureyev knocked on his door. Juno realized that he had been expecting this, expecting Peter to come to his room and see him instead of going to his own room to get the rest he almost definitely needed desperately. He wasn’t sure what he would have done if Nureyev hadn’t come. Paced until morning? Or until Buddy got tired of hearing his footsteps and came in with her blaster set to stun?

  They talked beforehand. Had a proper conversation that reduced both of them to tears multiple times, until Nureyev at last kissed him so sweetly that Juno got light headed. That night was reminiscent to their first night together, but this time Juno whispered into Nureyev’s shoulder exactly how in love with him he was. Nureyev froze at that, and Juno immediately began to backtrack. He finally felt enough to be able to say it out loud, but of course he would do it at the wrong moment. It was too soon, the wrong timing, Nureyev didn’t feel that way towards him anymore. His stammerings were cut off quickly by lips that murmured “I love you too”s between kisses. It was suddenly like their energy had been renewed, and now that the dam had broken, neither could seem to hold in four years’ worth of love that kept tumbling out, until they were exhausted and aching, both from the violent fight that had taken place less than 24 hours ago and from more recent activities.

  The fourth time Juno didn’t see coming. Neither of them had much time in the last week to do much other than sneak into one another’s rooms and collapse into bed, kissing lazily until sleep overcame them. Then they were between jobs, and suddenly had all the time in the world to relax and have fun. The crew spent the night celebrating and playing games, and then Juno and ‘Apollo’ retired to bed, not even bothering to pretend it wasn’t the same bed, not after Rita had directly and drunkenly called them out earlier in the night.

  Juno sat in bed with his comms, reading some novel or other that Rita had sent him a pdf of, while Peter brushed his teeth in the adjoining bathroom. He cleared his throat when he reentered the bedroom, and Juno nearly dropped his comms when he looked up. Peter was in a pale pink babydoll and shorts that looked like they had text on the ass. He swayed his hips as he walked towards the bed, and Juno grinned, setting aside his comms and giving Peter his full attention. He suddenly revealed that the shorts were breakaway by tearing them off of his body, and Juno let out a genuine laugh.

  Immediately, he felt bad and began to apologize for laughing directly in the face of the man trying to be sexy for him, but when he looked into Peter’s eyes, they’re brighter than they were, narrowed in glee and determination. That look made Juno want to completely abandon his vow of stoicism (he was never really good at keeping it anyway) and give into the giggles that rattled in his chest. Peter waggled his eyebrows as he made an exaggeratedly sexy crawl towards his partner on the bed, and Juno let his head tip back as he laughed, until Peter was on top of him, kissing his exposed throat.

  It continued in the same vein that night, and when Juno managed to make Peter giggle sincerely by blowing a raspberry on his inner thigh, he suddenly completely understood the appeal he had seen in Peter’s face at making him laugh.

  So no, Juno had never known that sex was meant to be fun, not in the way that he made it with Peter that night, and every night they spent together following. While he definitely always had a fun time doing it with other people, his time spent in bed with his thief did nothing short of convince himself of the concept of soulmates, and that he had found his in the man who had given him his name.

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on tumblr @theritaminute !!!


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